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Supreme People's Court (SPC) Vice President Wan Exiang announced September 25 that the SPC is taking further steps to reclaim the power of review over all death penalty decisions, according to the September 27 edition of the China Youth Daily. In a public lecture at the Beijing Institute of Technology, Vice President Wan said that the SPC will add three criminal tribunals to cope with the additional work from taking back the death penalty review power. He added that this latest move will be vital to maintaining judicial neutrality.

Supreme People's Court (SPC) Vice President Wan Exiang announced September 25 that the SPC is taking further steps to reclaim the power of review over all death penalty decisions, according to the September 27 edition of the China Youth Daily. In a public lecture at the Beijing Institute of Technology, Vice President Wan said that the SPC will add three criminal tribunals to cope with the additional work from taking back the death penalty review power. He added that this latest move will be vital to maintaining judicial neutrality.

A September 28 report in the Legal Daily suggests that recent SPC moves have now gone beyond publicity; the Court has taken concrete action on reforming death penalty review procedures. The Legal Daily provides a particularly favorable interpretation of the August 2005 promotions of Judges Zhang Jun and Xiong Xuanguo to the status of SPC Vice Presidents, characterizing their appointments as positive moves toward building a more qualified judicial review staff. The China Youth Daily article, however, notes concern from the National Judges College that three new criminal tribunals will require training at least 300 new judges. This number reflects the view that increased workloads will result from provincial high courts transferring death penalty cases back to the new panels. Provincial high courts currently review over 90 percent of the death sentences handed down in China, according to a Defense Lawyer Net article.

China has the highest death penalty rate in the world, with at least one domestic source hinting that nearly 10,000 executions take place each year. Agence France-Presse, the South China Morning Post, and Xinhua reported on the executions of at least 26 people in the weeks leading up to the National Day holiday on October 1.

According to a series of analyses posted by Xinhua on September 27, 28, and 29, recent moves to take back death penalty review reflect growing concern over the need to avoid wrongful executions similar to those of She Xianglin and Nie Shubin. Wrongful convictions created a public outcry in 2005, focusing attention on flaws in the criminal justice system that included coerced confessions and the assignment of death penalty cases to lower-level courts.

The Southern Daily editorial points out that the SPC's transfer of death penalty review has led to corrupt practices, particularly since the provincial high court reviewing the sentence is often the same court adjudicating the case. In addition, the finances of the provincial courts are under the control of local administrative bodies, making those courts more susceptible to local pressures than the SPC is. Vice President Wan emphasized in his lecture that reclaiming the death penalty review power would help ensure that the reviewing procedure remains neutral from administrative departments and intervention by other powers.

Reform of China’s Criminal Procedure Law was a focal point for Chinese representatives at the 22nd Congress on the Law of the World held in Beijing and Shanghai in September. Xinhua reported that the appearance of witnesses in court, a defendant’s right to remain silent, and criminal interrogation procedures continue to be pressing issues.